🚀 go-pugleaf

baud@kepler (Kurt Baudendistel) writes:

>In article <1991Jul6.090850.18499@cs.sfu.ca> miron@cs.sfu.ca (Miron Cuperman) writes:
>Now, let's examine these in detail:

>   [...] Or, I can
>   give the product away free and charge only for warranty protection
>   (thus bypassing the first company in the above example), but make
>   an initial warranty fee required.

The more reliable your product, the more people will gain from copying
the program and supporting it from another source, foregoing the warranty.
So either make your program buggy and obfuscated or you will not be
able to cover your initial cost (if you use the GPL).

>   The trick here is that if you have to get the customer to buy your
>   product, and they want to get certain things for their money: a quality
>   product and assurrance that it will work (on an ongoing basis).
>   Whether your software is copylefted or not makes no difference on these
>   topics (as is being currently demonstrated by Cygnus).

Demonstrated by Cygnus only on a very specific kind of software.  This
doesn't work for specialized or shrink wrap software.  Again, the net
income for the original developer is inversly proportional to the
robustness and quality of the initial product if the GPL is used.

>2. I don't have to start from scratch if I can take/buy a GPL'd package
>   and modify it into a new product. If I could save a significant portion
>   of the development cost, that's several sales sooner that I make a
>   profit!

Well, in the project that I'm writing now I can't use other work for more
than about 10% of it because it is radically different than anything
available.

>3. Do you think that one guy who bought the software package is such a
>   schmuck that s/he will just give it away to all comers? No, s/he won't,
>   but something equivalent will probably happen to deprive the original
>   seller of profit in this scenario.

Well, I suppose I'm a shmuck.  I will go for the greatest profit for
myself.  If that includes copying software which is under the GPL
instead of paying the original author then that is what I will do.  The
word schmuck is probably wrong here.  Try rationally selfish.

>4. How about all the little PC guys improving the software! I know that
>   they can do a better job of it than the big company! This is clearly
>   demonstrated by all the PD software out there that works great!

Show me a PD high end desk top publishing system.  Or an expert
system.  Or a CAD system.  Or something like Mathematica.  You cannot
do it PD or under the GPL because you would go bankrupt.

>   Also, Elizabeth notes that most PC software doesn't NEED improvement, so
>   why does it have to cost a lot to get it?
It is valuable because it is high quality, robust software.  Do you
mean that the less room for improvement - the less it is worth?
Strange indeed.

>Think about the scenarios in full before passing judgement. The copyleft,
>GPL and LGPL, have a lot to offer as alternatives to PD and proprietary
>software.

Yes, in some cases it works.  In others it doesn't.

>Kurt Baudendistel ---                                           --- GRA


--	
	by Miron Cuperman <miron@cs.sfu.ca>